Cap­tain de­clares three­day state mourn­ing

CHANDIGARH: Pun­jab chief min­is­ter Cap­tain Amarinder has ex­pressed grief over the death of Mar­shal Ar­jan Singh, and de­clared a three-day state mourn­ing as a mark of re­spect to the gal­lant of­fi­cer.

There would be no of­fi­cial cel­e­bra­tions and the na­tional flag would fly at half-mast in all the gov­ern­ment build­ings dur­ing these three days, an of­fi­cial spokesper­son said.

In his con­do­lence mes­sage, the CM said Ar­jan Singh’s con­tri­bu­tion to the na­tion would re­main etched in his­tory. In his death, In­dia has lost a great son of the soil, who al­ways re­mained at the fore­front to de­fend the coun­try’s bor­ders from the ex­ter­nal in­va­sions on the one hand and to up­hold the supreme tra­di­tions and glory of the armed forces on the other. His con­tri­bu­tion to the air force dur­ing World WAR-II and dur­ing the 1965 In­dopak war was un­par­al­leled, he added.

The CM re­called that Singh had the dis­tinc­tion of be­com­ing the only liv­ing five-star mil­i­tary of­fi­cer, be­sides be­ing the first air chief mar­shal of the In­dian Air Force.